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The Great Revolt of 1648

The great uprising of 1648 turned to be one of the most cataclysmic events in the history of Ukraine. Really, it’s quite difficult to find a similar revolt of such enormous magnitude, impact and intensity in the early modern history of Europe.

Perhaps, you wonder why we’ve picked up exactly Ukraine. It feels like this country boasted a number of certain features, predisposing it to such a tremendous outburst. The recently colonized eastern provinces of Bratslav, Kiev, and Chernihiv, providing the stage for the revolt appeared to be unique not only in the Commonwealth, but in all Europe. As a matter of fact, they were the domain of some of Europe's most wealthy and powerful magnates. On the other hand, they were willing and capable to fight effectively for their own interests. In newly colonized Ukraine, some of Europe's most exploitive feudal lords were used to confronting some of their most defiant masses.

The magnates' penchant for coercion happened to be most evident in their active treatment of the peasantry. Having attracted the peasants to their vast latifundia via obligation-free large villages, they suddenly clamped down on them. Their demands soared increasingly greater. That’s especially true to the period after the final defeat of the Cossack as well as peasant rebels in 1638.

Formerly unburdened peasants got unexpectedly forced to provide their lords with up to four days of labor a week. Besides this, they had to furnish noblemen landowners with a number of assorted personal services, simultaneously paying a tax on their farm animals and homes to the royal treasury. To make matters worse, Ukraine’s magnates frequently resorted to the controversial practice of leasing, suggesting that the leaseholder agreed that anything which could be potentially squeezed out of the peasants above a set figure, happened to be his profit. Forbidden to own land, though allowed to lease it, Jews often acted as leaseholders. On the vast lands of the Ostrorog family, there were up to 4000 Jewish leaseholders, and in 1616, approximately half the crown lands in this country were leased out to exactly Jewish entrepreneurs. Considering they had to make good investment in a relatively short period of two or three years, Jewish householders exploited the properties as well as peasants mercilessly, absolutely without regard for future consequences. It was quite common for a leaseholder to demand up to seven days of labor from the peasants and to drive them into the fields by means of the magnates' minions.

The great uprising of 1648 turned to be one of the most cataclysmic events in the history of Ukraine. Really, it’s quite difficult to find a similar revolt of such enormous magnitude, impact and intensity in the early modern history of Europe.